The Jackson standard. [volume] (Jackson C.H., Ohio) 1847-1888, 1887-04-07
Our Evening Sermon !
"a FOOLS lips enter into contention,
and his mouth calleth for strokes. y
Prov. 1876.

teenth century, he could have beheld |
the verifcation of this Proverb to a
greater degree now, than when the |
Proverb was written. Solomon lays |
great stress on the misfortunes aris-
ing from the state Of ools, and right
ly, for most of the misery of this
wicked old world of ours, comes direct
ly from and through foolishness The
affiiction of fools is felt every day, and
is a matter of ordinary observation
and experience On every side, as we
go rushing along this busy highway
of life, we behold the blank, express
sionless countenance of the fool, and
hear the meaningless gable, as he at
tempts to make more impressive and
emphatic the idea already implanted
in the mind Of the observer-that his
brain is barren ideality. His head
is an empty vessel, and when the
opening of the mouth permits the
wild winds to rush in, there is a roar.
That is all there is of the fool.
This class of creatures is never con-
tented ia folly-that is, ordinary or
commonplace foolishness. You can
not remain in the presence of the vic
tim of the emptiness of head, even for
few moments, without feeling the
weight O. Of his wonderfully shaped
and wrought opinion. He has an
opinion upon every subject brought
before the public mind, and he feels
that you are just dying to hear his
evaporations. The press, the pulpit,
politics, religion, science, any and all
things, are alike to him. He handles
one subject with fully as much ability
as he does another. His opinions flow
as glibly and uninterruptedly as the
stencil from slaughter-pen. He is
the intellectual garbage-dump of So
ciety. His mind is the sewer through
which passes all the vitiated atmos-
phere which would otherwise taint
the social system. When bad thing
gets into the mind of the fool, it is
made so ridiculous that it serves as a
warning to mankind, and thus good
comes from the folly
Let Us suppose, for moment, that
the fool imagines himself lawyer
in fact, let us go far enough to sup
pose that by some unaccountable
freak of magnanimity or charity, he
has been admitted to the bar While
he gets no practice in the courts, he
puts in his time upon the streets,
bowling about his superiors, and in
the sport which the public has at his
expense, he demonstrates the ridicu-
lous side of the profession, and those
members who have brains are thus
made the stronger in the opposite di-
riection, because of his foolishness.
The fool lawyer has more practice, of
his peculiar kind, than any other
member Of the profession. His prac-
tice consists in attending to every
body's business-save only his own.
What may be said Of the fool law
yer, may be said Of the fool doctor,
or member of any other profession.
Where the fool is, rest assured he will
be made manifest. His only stock in
trade is his folly, and he does a lively,
if improbable, business in that line.
1t is perhaps in politics, however, that
the fool reaches the topmost round Of
the ladder Of his ambition. Here as
elsewhere, he imagines that brains are
at discount and cheek at premium,
that wind should take the place Of
thought, and that blatant idiocy is
far superior to reign of common
sense The political fool, always be-
lieves in sending things through with
a rush, regardless of consequences or
chances Of success. Defeat never
teaches him anything, as the appeals
Of wisdom fail to impress him. When
the exciting breezes of the political
field blow open the doors Of his capa-
cious mouth, he roars at everybody
and everything. He has no aim be-
yond that of making noise, and ex-
citing disgust.
Solomon was right, when he wrote
that FOOLS lips enter into contention,
and that his mouth calleth for strikes.
If some righteous influence were ex-
erted in the good work of showering
blows upon the mouths of fools, the
work of Christianity and human pro-
gress would go with greater speed and
success in this world. His mouth
calleth for strokes; it was made to hit;
it seems cast in that peculiar mould
which seems designed to fit a good
heavy club; and it is a subject of re-
gret that the fool so often and so gen.
orally fails of attaining to the fulfill
ment of his destiny. The fool is the
rag-weed Of the social field, the thistle
of the pasture-only food for untamed
asses. He is the curculio Of the social
orchard, the weevil, and the rust, and
the fly, of the moral granary. He is
the blindly-rushing mole which plows
through the social and political
meadow, defacing the beauty thereof,
and accomplishing no good results.
He is boil on the social body, whose
nastiness is only equaled by its use
lessness. Yet as long as the world
stands, perhaps, the fool will go roar
ing down the ages on his mission of
disgust.
What we want, friends, is to turn a